Customer insights are seen as optional inputs, not long-term product drivers

Root causes of research waste in tech (2 of 3): Motivation

As research is created and consumed in tech organizations, it’s too often perceived as an optional input — rather than a consistent driver for success. It educates frequently and initiates less often.

There’s a motivation problem. Researchers may improve how they catalog their learning together, but they also need new levers to motivate their colleagues to apply that learning.

Transforming insights into product plans and launched outputs requires power over resources. That power usually lies in the hands of a range of different decision makers, with each owner accountable to their own team’s charter and goals. As insight consumers, these decision makers can effectively choose which — if any — insights they will apply to their own piece of product development and delivery.

Across the industry, there’s limited discussion of accountability for critical learning. Even as many organizations enable diverse roles to conduct their own customer investigations, there’s often little effort to keep tabs on what happens with ‘show stopping’ insights.

It’s not uncommon to perceive researchers as a type of service workers — rather than product stakeholders who advocate for customer problems grounded in real-world learning.

Within this larger context, many people who generate insights have taken on a sort of learned helplessness. Researchers run studies and try to activate the learning within defined groups of stakeholders — but they may not feel especially responsible for the successful leap from insight to informed action. Beyond running a workshop and attending some subsequent team meetings, they’re often not sure what else they — as an individual — could be doing. Besides, researchers’ workloads can already feel severe. There’s always more new questions that need investigation (many of which could be informed with existing learning).

You can work to grow more post-study involvement on both sides of the insight creation and consumption divide.

This enticement can gain traction and find its footing by connecting research into the planning mindsets and practices that owning teams are already using today.

To increase motivation to apply insights in product development, you can try the following ways forward:

• Help your research community prioritize across their collected learning, clarifying which insights could matter most for future plans.
• Provide specific ways for insight creators and consumers to expand their shared ownership of research-inspired planning.
• Advocate for leaders in your organization to evolve their definitions of success, using research to advance the criteria used to judge plans and releases.

Much more to come on these topics in forthcoming ‘Stop Wasting Research’ book for Rosenfeld Media

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